Wednesday, 7 December 2016

Champions League round-up: Arsenal win in Basel as PSG Draw 7.12.2016

Man City and Celtic played out an exciting 1-1 draw at the Etihad Stadium tonight. Although neither team had anything to play for both teams went at it from the start.

Celtic struck first when Man City loanee Patrick Roberts skipped in from the right hand side onto his favoured left foot and smashed the ball past Caballero in the City net.

Celtic didn't hold the lead for long though and the home side equalised four minutes later through Iheanacho.

An end-to-end game saw a silky counter-attack from Man City when Zabaleta fed Iheanacho on the edge of the box only to fire wide.

Celtic came storming back when James Forrest broke down the left and played a perfect ball to Dembele who had two attempts to give the Glasgow side the lead only to be denied by Cabellero first before smashing it wide off the rebound.

City dominated the second part of the opening half with Iheanacho coming close a number of times. Celtic should have had a penalty after Roberts cut into the City box again from the right only to be pulled back by Clichy.

The referee and his assistants gave a corner when it should have been a spot-kick. The teams went into the break level at 1-1.

The game picked up where it left off with both teams attacking from the back. Nolito thought he had given City the lead after a quick counter-attack from a Celtic corner but it was chalked off for offside.

The game continued in the same vein but neither side could find the winner and both teams deserved a point from an exciting game that had nothing riding on it.

In the other group match, Barcelona trashed Mochengladbach 4-0 at the Nou Camp. Goals from Messi and a seventeen minute hat-trick from Arda Turan gave them their fifth win from six group stage matches to finish six points ahead of Man City.

Elsewhere Arsenal recorded a comfortable 4-1 away win over Basel. Lucas Perez scored a scored a hat-tick along with a goal from Iwobi to secure top place in the group after PSG slipped up in Paris.

Ludogorets stunned PSG at home 2-2 and despite a late strike from Di Maria, they couldn't find another and must settle for the runner-up spot and a tougher knock-out tie.

Napoli traveled to Benfica and goals from Callejon and Mertens gave them a 2-1 win despite Jiménez Rodríguez scoring late on for the home team.

Dynamo Kiev did Benfica a huge favour hammering Besiktas 6-0. Goals from Besedin, Yarmolonko, Buyalskiy, Sydorchuk and Moraes Junior consigned the Turkish side to a heavy away defeat. They also had two players sent off.

Bayern Munich beat Atletico Madrid 1-0 but the result mattered little as Madrid had an unassailable lead at the top of the group before kick-off. Manuel Neuer kept his 33rd clean sheet of the competition.